I do. I'm really lucky. Fred came with me to the doctor today. He bought me a falafel and soup on the way home and brought back donuts later after running some errands. My mom and sister both called to check on me, and I've been exchanging texts with the couple of friends I told today. I'll tell work tomorrow. The HR people at my store are really awesome and have seen me through a lot in the last 5+ years. My team is great too, and has always been super supportive through all my other crazy health crepe.

Back in August, I interviewed for a position out in Seattle, and didn't get it. Given the circumstances, I'm so freaking glad I didn't. My family is all less than 5 hours away by car/train, and I have made so many good friends in my last 8 years in Chicago. I really am so incredibly lucky to have them. As much as we want to be there right now, I really don't know what I would do if I was out there, with basically just Fred as my support system.

Thank you all so much for your love and support over this. I've only met a handful of PPKers in real life, but you guys and this place mean so, so much to me. Thank you, thank you, thank you! <3

kara kara, you are really strong and amazing and I wish you only the best. Lots of love from up here. <3

Joined: Wed Oct 20, 2010 5:36 pmPosts: 1693Location: the land of too much wine and wind

You PPKers are the best. <3

I mixed wine and whiskey last night and slept horribly. I kept waking up because I was overheating, and then when I did fall asleep, I had the most awful dream. I dreamt I woke up at 9.40 for my 8am shift and when I realized what happened, I started having an anxiety attack thinking about losing my job and insurance a month before my surgery. I was paralyzed with fear and just kept screaming and screaming this low, throaty, raspy, sobby wail of a scream. I somehow woke myself up, but it was 5am, so by the time I got back to sleep, my alarm started going off to get up for work. So now I'm exhausted and in this awful headspace all day and I'm really afraid I'll snap at a customer, which would be bad, since I have a job dialogue and raise coming up soon.

I'm so tired I could start crying any moment. I just want to go home. Thankfully I only have a couple hours left.

_________________I just brought out the carrot sticks. This is war. - paprikapapaya

i just feel like shiitake, plain and simple.yesterday was the end of this semester, which could have potentially been the last of my university degree, so i ought to be relieved and happy.but i completely bombed my exams, and i know i failed at least one of the four courses i was taking, so this is going to bring my already too low average down even further, putting me on academic probation.i've already had to drag out my education due to an eating disorder which has rendered me unable to function like a normal 25 year old man (and just won't forking GO AWAY, despite treatment after treatment after treatment...) and i just feel like i'm sitting here, smoking too much weed and eating too much food and sleeping too much (in a pathetic attempt to finally (finally! really, i promise, this time!) reach and maintain a weight of more than 90 pounds and get back proper physical and cognitive functioning and energy), wasting my parent's money on a degree in philosophy that won't get me anywhere in life even when (or if) i do eventually get it.my head is such an awful place right now.

we are on one income right now and we hardly buy anything at all and I never go out with friends or buy clothes or get a haircut or anything else but my husband is out all night spending tons of money drinking at a bar.

_________________I like my bagels like I like my men - big and covered with earth balance & nooch. - Bunniee

i just feel like shiitake, plain and simple.my head is such an awful place right now.

Your situation sounds terrible! I don't have much smart advice other than whenever I am in a situation when everything is too much and too overwhelming and it seems like it'll never end, I tell myself that in a couple of years I will be looking back at that moment and I will somehow have survived and moved on with life.Sometimes that helps. But yeah, I relate.. so, hang in there. Do you have any close friends that you could spend time with and just share your pain with? I might help with distracting you a little so your head doesn't spiral deeper and deeper.Do you have access to professional help like a therapist?

Kara Kara I hope your day gets much better and that you manage to get some rest tonight. I'm so sorry to hear about what you're going through right now, it sucks balls & I'm sending you all of my best wishes and hugs.

lobsteriffic wrote:

we are on one income right now and we hardly buy anything at all and I never go out with friends or buy clothes or get a haircut or anything else but my husband is out all night spending tons of money drinking at a bar.

If this is an ongoing issue you should talk to him about it. My husband & I have one income coming in too and after bills, savings, money for food and going to movies together and stuff we split the rest equally. Being married or in a LTR makes you a team!

i just feel like shiitake, plain and simple.my head is such an awful place right now.

Your situation sounds terrible! I don't have much smart advice other than whenever I am in a situation when everything is too much and too overwhelming and it seems like it'll never end, I tell myself that in a couple of years I will be looking back at that moment and I will somehow have survived and moved on with life.Sometimes that helps. But yeah, I relate.. so, hang in there. Do you have any close friends that you could spend time with and just share your pain with? I might help with distracting you a little so your head doesn't spiral deeper and deeper.Do you have access to professional help like a therapist?

i really appreciate this, thank you.my partner is trying to help me as much as he can, which is nice.and i do have professional supports.

lobsteriffic wrote:

we are on one income right now and we hardly buy anything at all and I never go out with friends or buy clothes or get a haircut or anything else but my husband is out all night spending tons of money drinking at a bar.

oh, i can relate. my partner and i are not financially well-off (the only reason we can pay rent and bills is because i'm on disability), and he went out a few nights ago and bought himself a bunch of things, including a $30 bottle of whiskey and a bottle of red wine, neither of which i like. the thing is, we had been planning on getting a bottle of wine on sunday to celebrate being finished school stuff, and i imagined we would go together and choose something we could both agree on (our tastes in alcohol are very different), but now we can't do that since i'm not comfortable spending any more unnecessary money just so i can have a glass of wine, you know?

Dad's cancer is growing back aggressively and he seems really unwell, and is in a lot of pain. We start more chemo in January. I'm sad because he really was doing so well and now he seems even more frail.

I'm feeling suffocated, manipulated, and disrespected by my family and it's really hard to deal with. I wish I was not related to these people. I also feel really isolated like I have to hide what's happening from my friends and other family because mental illness is still taboo.

I'm feeling suffocated, manipulated, and disrespected by my family and it's really hard to deal with. I wish I was not related to these people. I also feel really isolated like I have to hide what's happening from my friends and other family because mental illness is still taboo.

I'm so sorry you're dealing with this; I can totally relate. My parents are coming for xmas and I'm getting stressed about it as it gets closer. Their relationship is so messed up.

My current boss came to tell me that he's switching my supervisor to someone I work with who's a manager but I have a lot of complicated weird feelings about her position and I got all emotional over it, annoyingly. I have some valid concerns, I think and some just emotional upset-ness over the whole thing so we're going to talk about it again tomorrow once I've calmed down and can actually articulate part of why I reacted the way I did.

As an addendum: he also said "you're not reacting how I expected" which I'm guessing means he wasn't expecting me to get upset? But at that moment I was kind of like what? You had an expectation of how I'd react?

I don't tend to get upset or express emotion very often at work, it usually only comes up at times like this but I *do* have a history of being overly emotional in situations like this so I don't know why he was so surprised by it.

I'm feeling suffocated, manipulated, and disrespected by my family and it's really hard to deal with. I wish I was not related to these people. I also feel really isolated like I have to hide what's happening from my friends and other family because mental illness is still taboo.

I'm so sorry you're dealing with this; I can totally relate. My parents are coming for xmas and I'm getting stressed about it as it gets closer. Their relationship is so messed up.

Thanks kiddo. May we all get through the holidays with our sanity intact!!